Nigerian church collapse kills 'at least 160' worshippers during bishop ordination
Updated
Metal girders and the roof of a crowded church have collapsed onto worshippers in southern Nigeria, killing at least 160 people with the toll likely to rise, a hospital director says.
Key points:
- Mortuaries overflowing after church collapses
- Hospital director says 160 dead, expects toll to rise
- Crane being used to lift debris
- Building collapses are common in Nigeria
Mortuaries in the city of Uyo are overflowing from Saturday's tragedy, said medical director Etete Peters of the University of Uyo Teaching Hospital.
The Reigners Bible Church International was still under construction and workers had been rushing to finish it in time for Saturday's ceremony to ordain founder Akan Weeks as a bishop.
Hundreds of people, including Akwa Ibom state Governor Udom Emmanuel, were inside when metal girders crashed onto worshippers and the corrugated iron roof caved in, they said.
Mr Emmanuel and Bishop Weeks, who preaches that God will make his followers rich, escaped unhurt.
Screaming survivors were streaming out and there were cries from injured victims when computer program analyst Ukeme Eyibio rushed to the scene.
"There were trapped bodies, parts of bodies, blood all over the place and people's handbags and shoes scattered," Mr Eyibio said.
He had parked his car outside the complex to make a phone call, heard a deafening explosion he thought was a bomb only to see that the church had disappeared, he said.
Mr Eyibio and three others managed to drag 10 wounded people from an overflow area for worshippers just outside the collapsed church but they did not enter the main structure because a construction worker among them warned of the danger of a further collapse.
The worker called his boss at Julius Berger construction company, who sent a crane to help lift debris off bodies.
'Dying all around us'
While they waited for the crane, Mr Eyibio tried to help a man whose legs were trapped under a steel girder.
"I rushed to my car, got out the tyre jack and used that to get the beam off his legs," he said.
"We managed to get him out but we saw others dying all around us.
"I'm so traumatised I could not sleep last night for the horrors repeating themselves in my mind."
Video posted to Facebook showed the aftermath of the collapse (warning: graphic content).
Many uncounted victims are in private mortuaries scattered across Uyo, youth leader Edikan Peters said.
He said some people are secretly taking the bodies of relatives to their homes because mortuaries are overcrowded and some do not have refrigeration.
Journalists at the scene claim that church officials are trying to prevent them from documenting the tragedy, trying to seize cameras and forcing some to leave the area.
The governor's spokesman, Ekerete Udoh, said the state government will hold an inquiry to investigate if anyone compromised building standards.
Buildings collapse often in Nigeria because of endemic corruption with contractors using sub-standard materials and bribing inspectors to ignore shoddy work or a lack of building permits.
AP
Topics: accidents, disasters-and-accidents, nigeria
First posted
